A couple of solid reports this week on mortgages paint a picture of a market that’s healing, with loan access and demand rising.

Tuesday morning the Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its monthly gauge of mortgage-credit availability grew in July, rising for a third consecutive month. Even better: While recent readings have shown more access to jumbo mortgages — high-value loans typically reserved for well-heeled borrowers – there’s also been growth for loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration, which has relatively low requirements for down payments and credit histories.

Some of the most challenging post-bubble roadblocks to the housing market’s recovery have been the stiff credit standards erected in the wake of the financial crisis. Banks have paid out massive penalties for shoddy loans, and, not surprisingly, made it much tougher for borrowers to obtain residential mortgages, in the process cutting out many families whom economists say should be creditworthy.

But there are now at least two significant factors working in borrowers’ favor. First, job growth is improving – a trend that helps household finances and stokes banks’ willingness to lend. Loan applications to buy a home, though still below 2013’s levels, have meandered higher since earlier this year (see chart), MBA data show. Second, last year’s spike in mortgage rates shredded lenders’ refi business, and they’re hungry for loan revenue.

MBA reported Tuesday that its mortgage-credit-availability index rose 0.5% in July to 116.4 — the highest level in more than three years — signaling a loosening of credit. The index equaled 100 in March 2012. The credit-access gauge is still far below bubble levels that reached above 800.

Here’s that second promised batch of good mortgage news: Some borrowers look like they’re acclimating to 2013’s interest rate shock, when mortgages became pricier on market speculation about when Federal Reserve officials would start paring their massive asset-purchase program that had been exerting downward pressure on long-term rates. The Fed reported Monday that more banks are easing than tightening standards for prime residential mortgages, and that they’re seeing stronger demand for these loans for the first time in a year.

“The strengthening in mortgage demand evident in the Fed’s latest…survey suggests that the housing recovery is back on track after having stalled in the first half of the year,” Paul Dales, senior U.S. economist at Capital Economics, wrote in a research note. “Admittedly, the Fed noted that the level of credit conditions is still stricter than the average seen since 2005. After having tightened in the previous two quarters, though, at least standards are loosening once again.”